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Kengo Kuma built this tent-like tourist transportation center by using extruded aluminum materials
China Architecture News - Jan 31, 2019 - 00:53 30202 views
Kengo Kuma's firm Kengo Kuma and Associates has designed a tent-like tourist transportation center on a waterfront in Xiangcheng District of Suzhou, China.
Named Xiangcheng Yangcheng Lake Tourist Transportation Center, the structure acts a new interpretation of a tent with with extruded aluminum materials.
Image © Erieta Attali
The 6,848-square-metre building functions as tourist center as well as a ship yard, retail space. The new building draws an introverted architectural language through its double-roofs. Designed as two building, the two structures are connected with a bridge and takes visitors via a ramp. The ramp is shielded by a secondary roof that extends towards waterfront.
Image © Tsehou Hsiao
Due to its irregularly-overlapped roofs, it is impossible to understand where the actual buildings start and end under roofs. The building was designed as a port terminal for the lake, called Yangcheng, which is known for the production of Shanghai crabs.
"We aimed to build a topographic structure as a large hill by randomly placing aluminum extruded materials with single-sized sections," said Kengo Kuma and Associates.
Image © Erieta Attali
In the interior, the spaces are designed as the assemblage of slanted floors, in order to maintain the same landform both in inside and outside that create some random yet ambiguous state.
Kengo Kuma is known with the use of local materials and the use of different materials on different typologies. By using materials in different spatial dimensions, the architect creates various architectonics and textures applied on facades.
Image © Erieta Attali
Image © Erieta Attali
Image © Erieta Attali
Image © Erieta Attali
Image © Tsehou Hsia
Kengo Kuma and Associates recently renovated Camper’s first shop in Barcelona with vault-shaped ceramic plates. The firm also completed a community library and welfare center in Yusuhara Town, Japan.
Project facts
Project name: Xiangcheng Yangcheng Lake Tourist Transportation Center
Architect: Kengo Kuma and Associates
Location: Xiangcheng District, Suzhou, China
Program: tourist center, ship yard, retail
Date: 2018.10
Size: 6,848m2
Top image © Erieta Attali